Thursday, 29 March 2012

It feels like forever ago that I last posted, but it's only been a few days! As you can probably guess from the name of this post I have arrived safely in Korea :) Despite my deep deep hatred of long haul flights (I die of boredom and discomfort) the two flights (7 and 8 hours) weren't too bad. I actually managed to sleep for 6 hours during the last one! Although I did wake up with neck cramp due to my weird plane seat position. On the second flight there was a young toddler in front of me, I was about to give up on my sanity because in all my experience babies cry on planes, no exceptions, but this little toddler fell right to sleep for 8 hours and woke up just before landing. It was incredible!

Yesterday I had a lazy day (still being jet lagged) I met my friends friends and we went out for an evening meal and then some drinks (although the bar only had beer, which I hate > . <). So far the food in Korea has been SO YUMMY, I'm never entirely sure what I'm ordering, but it's always nice. Before I arrived I had awful visions of still squirming squid and unidentifiable deep sea fishes. But so far everything has been gorgeous *getting hungry whilst thinking of food*.

Today was meant to be a quiet shopping day/explore of the streets around my hotel. Instead it turned into a crazy shopping spree during which I spent nearly all of the money I exchanged at the airport and had to get more out... :S But at least I can justify it by remembering that I haven't shopped properly in months because I've been saving so I can go a bit crazy whilst I'm here :P

Be prepared for a rather long haul...

This bag is sooooo cute! I've been wanting a satchel for ages to carry my uni work in :)

My one true love, in necklace form, I adore the turquoise and gold combination.

I needed a new eyeshadow brush as mine are old and a bit skanky, and this Missha one was just to cute to say no to!

Sheet masks, 5 aloe vera, 5 green tea and one rice :)

Prettiest lipstick packaging ever.

Pretty packaging for a pretty coral!

Everything in the Skin Food shop was too pretty for words.

So very in love with these colours! I can hardly bear to use them and ruin them though!

I chose this after trying every single BB cream in Tony Moly, the salesgirl was following me round with loads of make up remover > . < I felt so bad!

Cupcakes and tea cups!

I've needed a good brow set for ages, and this one looked cute :)

Ah! I can't believe how much stuff I bought! Everything is so cheap over here, but it all adds up in the end :P I also bought some of my friends some presents and I've started gathering a few things for my Korea giveaway ;) But I'm going to keep those a surprise for now.

(Also, I have SO MANY free samples now, I think I'll throw some in as an extra for the giveaway, because I have gazillions!)

﻿

Tomorrow the official touristy sight seeing part of my holiday starts, we'll start off with Hwaseong Fortress tomorrow, which I will take lots of pictures of :D But don't worry, the shopping part has not ended yet! Next week we're heading to Seoul for the markets and hopefully some new clothes (and in the meantime I'll be adding to the giveaway :P ).

Sunday, 25 March 2012

I'm going to start this post with an apology, sorry sorry sorry for taking so long to do this! I was tagged absolutely ages ago! So I'm finally doing it now :P I was tagged two times, so I'll combine them here :) Thank you so much to the lovely Yoyo and Mui Mui for tagging me to do this. They both have really adorable, fun interesting blogs you should check out :)

11 facts,
11 questions,
tag 11 people,
you get the gist :P

So without much further ado, I'll start:

Facts

1) I've snapped the big toenail off my left foot three times, once from dropping a bookcase on it (that killed), once from someone kicking it off when I was barefoot and they had HUGE shoes on and once walking back to my boyfriends house through the woods completely smashed and tripping over a root.

2) I hate people who don't clean up in the kitchen > . < Sharing a kitchen with messy people at uni kills me (especially when they use and then don't wash up my things *grumble grumble*)

3) I've only just started watching Pretty Little Liars AND I LOVE IT.

4) I've once gotten lost in the middle of Reading after a night out with my friend and wandered around drunk until daylight where we had to ask a dogwalking stranger for directions...classy.

5) When I was little my favourite book ever was The Goose Girl by Shannon Hale, I've read it so many times.

6) Now my favourite book is Jane Eyre, and it will never ever ever change because it's the best book ever :P
7) My favourite Audrey Hepburn film is How To Steal A Million ( * - * love you Audrey)
8) I'm chilly

9) Even if I don't talk to my best friends for a while at uni the moment we meet up again it's as though nothing has changed <3

10) My favourite shop in the world is Liberty's in London, the first time I went there was when I was about 8 and I haven't stopped loving it.

Yes - _ - Only for reading, but I hate them because they're never where I put them!

4) Are you very sweet and kind in public but a totally different person when you're with people you're close to?

I reckon I'm kind to people I'm close to, my boyfriend says I hit him too much...But then laughs because my punches are too feeble...

5) Are you outgoing?

Only with my friends, then I'll go a little bit mad.

6) What's the first thing you notice in a guy? Is it the most important trait?

I'm shallow, so I notice looks first, but it's really not the most important, you can ruin good looks by opening your mouth and saying something idiotic or nasty.

7) When you tell jokes, does your friends usually laugh because of the funny-ness of the joke or they laugh at how stupid and lame the joke it? (weird question XD)

I've been told I'm terrible at telling jokes, I start laughing (and snorting) half way through telling the joke :P

8) How many languages do you know?

I did French and Spanish at school, I can remember fragments of Spanish and nearly no French :P I'm desperately trying to learn a few useful phrases for Korea, but so far I can't say I can actually properly speak a language other than English.

9) What's your favourite brand of make-up?

Benefitttttt <3 Which most of my make up collection consists of, I really do mean to branch out :P

10) Headphones or earphones?

Earphones, they're more practical, but headphones can look really cute.

11) If you could invent anything, what would it be?

Bernard's watch! It would be the most amazing thing ever, but I wouldn't tell anyone, I'd keep it to myself :P I always wish I had one at concerts so I could use it to get to the barrier :P

My Questions :

1) What is your favourite item of clothing you own?

2) Favourite drink for a sunny afternoon?

3) Would you prefer camping in the countryside or staying in a 5 star hotel?

Thursday, 22 March 2012

Finally after what feels like centuries the Revlon lip butters are out in the UK! Well actually they were out on Monday, but sadly my uni is in a teeny weeny town with the smallest Boots ever :P So when I went in on Monday there were none to be found! But I went in today, hoping to find them, and I did ^ - ^ I can't really afford these right now...but they're pretty :P

After looking at reviews and swatches I chose my three favourites : Strawberry Shortcake, Lollipop and Candy Apple :D So very pretty!

There are loads of reviews of these everywhere, so I won't go into too much detail, but these are beautiful, buildable and moisturising. Love love love :)

Lollipop is a vibrant fuchsia colour. This is the one I wanted most after looking at swatches online and reading reviews, however as gorgeous as this is it's not my favourite of the three after trying them on.

My favourite one (after trying them all) is Candy Apple. Oh the colour is so beautiful * - * it's an orange toned red, and gorgeous doesn't even begin to describe it!

This was just a short one, because there's just sooooo much about the lip butters online, but I just wanted to tell you all how much I adore my new buys :D

Tuesday, 20 March 2012

Technically I shouldn't be shopping because I have Korea in less than a week (!!!!! exciting !!!!!), but I only spent £8 on this haul as two things were free gifts and one was a pressie. So I'll get cracking on the haul :P

I'll start with my free gifts, I don't quite understand why I got these, the shop assistant explained it to me a couple of times....but I'm still a bit lost :P I think it was a special event at The Body Shop when I visited, and if I got a body shop card (usually £5, but I got mine for free) I'd get a discount, and free gifts for joining. So I picked up my mums Mother's Day pressie (which you can see here ).

I picked up a Body Butter duo, in Sweet Pea. I didn't actually know what Sweet Pea smelt like until I received this (and I love it :P) it's a really gentle floral scent. Because it's a duo there's a side for normal skin and a thicker cream on the other side for dry skin. That's the only flaw I see in the product, I use the dry skin cream on less areas than the normal skin side, so I think it would have been better to only have a quarter of the pot as a dry skin section. I can see myself using up the normal skin cream a lot faster than the dry skin section.

The second free gift I got was the White Musk Libertine body mist, I'm not usually a fan of body mists, but this one smells quite appealing, although it does have a talcum powder after smell (which I can't help but associate with my grandma :P). So I've been using this as a slight spritz over my clothes in my wardrobe (I like spraying my clothes to make them smell nice :P).

The next three things I bought myself. I've been craving pastels since it started getting warmer, but I couldn't allow myself to buy clothes, so I bought the cheaper alternative of nail polishes. I got these three Barry M nail polishes for £2.99 each, bargain :D I got : Mint Green (304), Berry (203) and Lemon (307). I love these so much, I can't stop looking at them and smiling :P I love springtime and warm weather :). However with all Barry M polishes I need a few layers to get a good colour.

Finally I got this gorgeous summer dress from Republic. This was the gift :) My boyfriend bought me this to wear in Korea because he'd seen me looking at it when we went shopping earlier in the week ^ - ^ I'm not seeing him for a whole month now because he's gone home for a shoulder operation and I've got my Korea holiday > . < I'll buy him loads of pressies from Korea :P

Not a huge haul (when I allow myself I can buy an awful lot more.... I fear to imagine how much I'll be buying in Korea :P), but a few good things in it :)

Sunday, 18 March 2012

So today is Mother's day, but instead of spending the day with my mum going out to lunch, or going shopping or something fun like that I'm stuck at uni - _ - However, as I only have one week left until the Easter holidays I have already gotten her a pressie and card so I can give them to her when I get home :D

I found this gorgeously wrapped set in the Body Shop for £20, it's from their Vitamin E collection which is formulated for *cough* older skin *cough* (my mum would kill me if I said that :P). I adore the light pink and black box, I know that half the excitement of a present for my mum is the packaging :P And in this way I think I take after her > . <.

This set comes with 4 products, a gentle facial wash, moisture cream, night cream and a small face wash. I am so in love with this set, it looks gorgeous. I'd forgotten how much I loved the body shop until I went into it yesterday, it smells so yummy (I may have bought a couple of things for myself too which I'll show in a collective haul soon).

Also every year I buy my mum a Lindt gold bunny for Easter, but this year I'll be away in Korea for Easter! So I'm giving her the bunny early (and I know that it will not last until Easter :P).

I can't wait for this week to be over! I have an exam and statistics (which I still don't actually understand) to do, and then I'll be off home for a couple of days and then off to KOREA!!! (exciting times :P).

Also, last night there was the most gorgeous mountain rainbow thing going on, I just had to take a photo :P

Friday, 16 March 2012

Despite telling myself that I was 100% not allowed to buy anything frivolous this month (which I have technically broken already) I decided that paying £2 for Glamour this month to receive a free product of Percy & Reed Totally TLC Hydrating Mask was allowed :P
Firstly I was attracted to this by the gorgeous design, it looks really sleek and chic with a cute drawing of a girl with enormous hair :P I'm not going to lie, the packaging was the reason I paid any attention to it, but hey, that's what packaging is meant for :P

I used this earlier and I had to google instructions for use, because the ones on the back aren't very good. I wasn't entirely sure if I had to put it on wet or dry hair or how long the best amount of time was (it said minimum 10 minutes). I found (on the Red website) that people saw the best results when their hair was slightly damp, so I used my hands to pour a small amount of water evenly over my hair and squeezed the excess out, and for about 20 minutes.

I made put my hair up and under a plastic bag turban (which I made myself :P) and then wrapped a towel around it as the instructions did say it worked best when warm. I had a fun 20 minutes wandering around with a hot pink turban then went to the shower to wash it off.
I have to say I really like this product, I don't usually use hair masks really, I think I've only ever tried one before and that was quite a while ago so I'm no expert. Since my hair has been incredibly dry recently I thought this was amazing. My hair really feels soft and silky. This is quite a good bargain as there is 100ml in the tube and I used two tiny blobs and I have medium length hair. I can't wait to use it when I've finally gotten my hair cut to get rid of all my nasty split ends (boooooo split ends, go away).
Percy & Reed also have a 'heat activating bonnet' which you can buy to accompany this product, although to me it just looks like a jazzed up shower cap :P I think I'll stick with my pink turban thank you :P

Wednesday, 14 March 2012

Yves Saint Laurent's Touche Eclat is one of the UK's biggest selling beauty products. It's really raved about and before I got mine I was pining like crazy for one. It's a highlighter, and according to YSL gives 'light, luminosity and radiance'. However it has one pretty major downside, the price, £25 for a highlighter....ouch ouch ouch ouch. I got mine as a Christmas present and I must admit, I probably would have carried on pining instead of buying it if I hadn't received it as a gift.

The packaging is beautiful and sleek, I adore how this looks in my make up collection. However as it is shiny gold it gets smudgy and has fingerprint marks all over it no matter how hard I try :P It also scratches easily when it's put in my make up bag (as you can probably see in the picture). These aren't exactly major faults, and I'm still 100% in love with the design.

The applicator is a clever little brush pump. To get the product you have to click the bottom of it and a small amount of product is released onto the brush, which I find is the perfect amount to use over my face. Ages and ages ago (two or three years I think) I had the Eyeko Touch Up and Go concealer (which was awful by the way :P I'm glad they don't stock it anymore) and it had a similar applicator. I really like this as it only releases a small amount of product at a time so you don't waste any.
My Touche Eclat is in the shade 1 (the original), they now stock 10 different shades, and I think the colour range looks quite good. My one has pink undertones which suits my skin very well. It's very very light, which I love, it literally glides onto my skin so easily.

I use this underneath my chin, around my mouth, the inner corners of my eyes and a little on my forehead to brighten up my complexion, and it works. I can really tell that my skin looks brighter and more awake whenever I use this product. Also, to do cover all of these areas takes the tiniest bit of product, so I can see this lasting me for quite a while. Some people seem to think of this as a concealer, but it's really not, it has no coverage properties whatsoever, when I first got it I thought I'd see if it could brighten my dark circles (as it is advertised as 'bringing the light') but it just isn't designed for that.

As much as I love this product the price (£25) is a real turnoff. Yes I probably will be re-purchasing when I run out, but it will hurt a bit :P If you see this at a lower price I would seriously recommend buying it as it is such a fantastic product. I noticed a few days ago whilst looking over the future co-buys from BuyaPowa that it's on sale soon (in shade 1, like mine). I recommend checking it out if you're interested (for those of you who don't know BuyaPowa is a website where they get discounts on loads of great beauty products, the more people who sign up to buy it the cheaper it gets, although there is a lowest price limit :P I've bought two products from there before and haven't been disappointed).

I hope you've enjoyed this review, I'd love to hear your thoughts on the Touche Eclat or if you know of any good dupes :)

Sunday, 11 March 2012

Today I was going to go running, tidy my bedroom, do my work and buy some ink for my printer. But I woke up at 2pm :S OOPSIE. My sleeping pattern has broken down in the last two weeks (thanks mainly to a reading week full of staying up late). I have to change this :P I took ages getting to sleep last night because I'd just watched Resident Evil 3 with my friends and the moment I turned off the light to go to bed I was just like ZOMBIES EVERYWHERE. So I watched some Secret Diary to get the zombies out of my head, getting to sleep at 5:30 am :P

Anyways I'm going out next week for a 'rock n' roll' night at a club in town :P So I thought I'd try and think of a cute rock look to wear out. I decided the focus to be on the elongated eyeliner (to get be a little edgier than I normally go for :P) and to have softer pink lips to make it more girly.

I thought this was cute, not too overwhelming and very sweet and girly. I may change my mind and go full out grungy emo girl to fit in with the rock theme :P But knowing me probably not :P

Random little life update : I've decided to start cooking proper meals from scratch (instead of just pasta and a heap of vegetables), so next week I'm going to try and make Tuscan Bean Soup and Asparagus and Egg Tartlets, yums! I hope they work out well :P

Wednesday, 7 March 2012

Normally I like happy upbeat posts, but this is a GRUMPY post :D Yehhh for grumpiness (although I'm in a really good mood whilst writing this :P). I've had an unbelievably sleepy day today, (I actually had a four hour nap after my only lecture of the day at 10), but it's been sooooo good :D. Because I've had an uncharacteristically productive weekend it actually feels nice to get back into lazy habits :P (I should not continue them though!).

So this post is about a few things which I bought (and one free from a magazine) which I really don't get along with. Some are worse than others. I only have 6 products to show you guys, I don't have more because I normally like to research beauty and make up items before I buy them, these were all (bar one) impulse buys. Not to say I haven't discovered great products whilst impulse buying, but that's for another time :P

I'll start with the least disappointing/unliked products:

Rimmel London Colour Rush Trio Eyeshadows (698 Modern Blues and 750 Tempting)
These weren't a terrible buy because I got them both for £1, but I was slightly disappointed in them. Despite being called 'Colour Rush' the colour payoff isn't good at all, I've only used them once each (with Modern Blues I just took it off straight away :P) and soooo much has to be packed onto my lids for noticeable colour. Also the fall out is huge, dusty eyeshadow cheeks is not really my kind of look... But not really too awful, I wore the Tempting colours (I don't really like these colours btw :P) on an army themed night and in every single photo you can barely tell there's anything on my lids > . <

E.L.F Eyeshadow Duo
Again this wasn't too disappointing because like all e.l.f products it was dirt cheap (I forget how much exactly). The colour payoff is better than the Rimmel eyeshadows, but the fallout is a bit worse. The reason why I was more disappointed with this product is because of the colour, on the website the swatches looked a bluey purple colour, and looked a bit warmer. These colours aren't bad, but they just weren't what I wanted.

Neal's Yard Remedies Eyeliner
Ages ago I did an eyeliner collection post, and this was in it as my least favourite eyeliner, so no surprise it's ended up here. Technically this was free in a magazine, so doesn't quite count, but I did buy the magazine because this eyeliner looked good. And it does, it looks gorgeous, I love the packaging, and I love the fact that it's organic. What I don't love is how faint the line is, how unclear and how hard you have to press to get any colour at all. It was fine on my hand, but my eyes are a lot more delicate. I was disappointed because it looks so good! (I still like keeping it in my collection for the prettyness though :P)

Avon Clear Skin Pore Penetrating Clay Mask
Awful, awful, awful, ickety ickety ick ick. Yeahhhhh I don't like this one. I bought it because it was only just over £3 and I wanted a clay mask. I used it once and will NEVER use it again. In my Glamour samples post I mentioned that the mystery face wash/mask was similar to this. They're both a horrible mint green colour and both have a worrying synthetic chemically smell. This mask says to put it on for 5 minutes, but I had to take it off after 2, it STINGS! I prefer natural based gentle products and I really have no idea why I bought this, it was such a daft purchase > . <.

John Frieda Sheer Blonde Go Blonder Shampoo and Conditioner
(I already threw away the conditioner, but still have the empty shampoo for photos :P). I wanted this for ages before I bought it. I love John Frieda, the Frizz Ease Curl Reviver Mousse may be one of my favourite hair care products of all time, so when this started being advertised I had to have it. It's pricey, about £5 per bottle (and they're only 250ml), so I thought it would be an investment. In the summer my hair goes naturally lighter, and I wanted this effect in winter too. It does appear to lighten my hair, slightly and naturally looking. However this winter I have had the driest hair of my life. So I started using night treatments and hair masks more rigorously. But the problem was only half fixed, I looked online about the Go Blonder products and I found LOADS of people saying it had dried out their hair. So I stopped using it and am now on Herbal Essences. I still need to get around to booking a hair cut for the most epic case of dry split ends I have ever experienced, but my hairs condition has improved dramatically since switching > . < Also this stuff stains pillows :S I normally let my hair dry naturally, and if I go to bed, or lie down on my pillow whilst my hairs still a bit wet an icky yellowish stain appears on it :S Icky.

I've stopped the grump now :D Back to happy times :) Even though nothing particularly exciting happened today (well excluding my mini epiphany when I realised I sort of kind of almost understand SPSS) I've just been in such a cheerful mood :P I hope you're all having a brilliant day too :)

(Also I've been re-watching Secret Diary Of A Call Girl all week, I LOVE Billie Piper, it's suchhhhh a great series. I watched some with my boyfriend yesterday, he didn't like it at all unsurprisingly :P).

Sunday, 4 March 2012

Hello ^ - ^ I reached 100 followers today and I'm so excited about it! Thank you to everyone who has followed me, it really makes me happy that you all like my blog *blushes* I have decided to do a little giveaway to celebrate...HOWEVER, who wants boring products from England? Seeing as I'm off to Korea in less than a month I thought I'd buy a few goodies there and give you guys the chance to win them :)

Anyway, this post is really about one of my favourite nail polishes, this is Ciaté's Dangerous Affair (013). It's a gorgeous vampy dark red, oh how I love it! I got this last year (I think) in Elle or Glamour or some similar magazine :P. It's my only Ciaté polish, but I NEED more in my life! It's gorgeous and shiny (I haven't been bothered to put a top coat on, so I'm pretty impressed with how it looks on its own). I have had to put on two coats, for some reason the first always looks streaky, but the second one is always perfect? Strange magic :P

Also the packaging is super duper cute! I have to have cute looking nail polishes, I have a shameful corner of my chest of drawers where all my horribly packaged nail polishes go :P (Including a very dodgy sick colour green I got for Halloween a few years back). The packaging has changed since I got mine, but not by much, the shape and bow are still there, but the label has Ciaté lower down and larger, which I think is a good thing as you can barely see the name on mine because of the bow.

These polishes are £9 each, but I think for a rainy day and a bit of a nail investment they're perfect. I do have a Ciaté wish list (for when I have money...which may be never :P), the colours I'm loving are: Knickerbockerglory (So pink!), Vintage (gorgeous grey), Cutie Pie (light perfect pink), Sugar Plum (pastel purple) and Couture Cream (nude pinky brown). Although really I want them all! :P

Today has been another beautiful mountain day, so I thought I'd share a (not exactly brilliant) snap I took earlier, it's hard to tell in the photo but the clouds went a gorgeous pinky colour! Apparently it was brighter over the sea, but alas I cannot see the sea from my uni halls :P